UK voters more critical of government over COVID - poll

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LONDON (Reuters) - Support for the British government’s handling of the coronavirus crisis has fallen, leading to a drop in Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s standing in the eyes of voters, a survey showed on Wednesday.

Forty-nine percent of respondents in the survey by polling firm Kantar thought the government was doing fairly or very well on coronavirus, down from 61% in April, while 43% said its handling was fairly or very poor, up from 30% in April.

Worries about the economy grew and four in 10 people said coronavirus had hit their personal income.

The concerns about the virus reduced voting intentions for Johnson’s Conservative Party to 51%, down 3 points from April, while the opposition Labour Party, under its new leader Keir Starmer, rose four points to 32%.

More encouragingly for Johnson, 59% said they were very or fairly likely to use the government’s planned coronavirus contact-tracing app, up from 53% in April. Kantar interviewed 1,130 people online between May 7 and May 11.